


how happiness goes

by cirrus (themorninglark)



Series: Sportsfest 2018 [7]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Gen, M/M, Sportsfest 2018
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-01
Updated: 2018-07-01
Packaged: 2019-05-31 16:24:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15123329
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themorninglark/pseuds/cirrus
Summary: “You nervous?” he asks.Shinsuke opens his mouth, pauses, then meets Aran’s gaze. “Yes.”Like his hands, there isn’t the slightest tremor in his voice. Shinsuke is sure of his own vulnerability, as he is sure of so much else.Kita and Aran in an emptied-out volleyball club room, the moment before it happens.





	how happiness goes

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Sportsfest 2018 Bonus Round 1: Time and Place | [originally posted here](https://sportsfest.dreamwidth.org/7464.html?thread=562472#cmt562472)

Aran finds Shinsuke in the club room, polishing a volleyball. “Hey.”

Shinsuke’s gaze flicks upwards, back down without missing a beat. They might have _kouhai_ to polish their equipment now, but this is one thing Shinsuke will never let go of, and Aran has learned that Shinsuke digs his heels in over the strangest things. It is thanks to Shinsuke, anyway, that the club room always smells lemony fresh instead of like days-old boys’ sweat, and he supposes he should be thankful for that.

He crouches down on the floor across from Shinsuke, starts to reach out, then stops. They’ve spent enough time together for Aran to know he doesn’t want to be the person disturbing Shinsuke’s rituals with a careless touch. Still, his hand hovers, and he waits for the infinitesimal break in those circular polishing movements before he touches Shinsuke on the arm. He can feel the tension running all the way down to his wrist, the way it melts away as he gives him a light squeeze.

“Coach Kurosu will be here in a second. It’s time.”

“Time,” Shinsuke echoes. Carefully, he sets the volleyball on his lap and folds up the towel. Fold by fold, Aran watches him and the way his hands never shake.

“You nervous?” he asks.

Shinsuke opens his mouth, pauses, then meets Aran’s gaze. “Yes.”

Like his hands, there isn’t the slightest tremor in his voice. Shinsuke is sure of his own vulnerability, as he is sure of so much else.

_Thought so._ Aran finds a smile coming to his face, and he wants to say as much, _thought so_ , but Shinsuke has a way of knocking him off balance when he is that disarmingly honest. It isn’t anything that Aran doesn’t know by now, that Shinsuke is just as human as them all. It’s just that he never gets used to hearing it from Shinsuke himself, when it’s so easy to put him on a pedestal. Their captain. His captain.

“I don’t know what to do,” says Shinsuke. “I’ve never received a uniform before. What do you do?”

Aran grins. “You take it. And then you do your best to live up to it.”

Shinsuke takes a deep breath, letting it out slowly. He tosses the ball into the cart next to them and lays the towel flat on top of a bench.

Aran straightens and holds out his hand. Shinsuke takes it.

“Come on,” says Aran, dragging him to his feet. “I want to see your face when Coach gives you that uniform. You’ll probably cry.”

Shinsuke blinks up at him. “I will not.”

He says this in the same way he once said _I don’t mind if I never get to play_ , and Aran feels it like a punch right in his gut. Call it a hunch, call it a premonition, call it the way Shinsuke’s hand is warm in his. He knows Shinsuke’s going to be happy today. It’s been a long time coming.


End file.
